Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug
It would take ~15% PST on top of the existing 5% GST to come close to balancing the budget, assuming no leakage (ex. higher rates forcing more transactions underground). Even without a PST and a poor economy, AB still brings in more revenue per capita than do other provinces. The mess that the NDP inherited is huge overfunding of health and especially education and infrastructure. To close the budget gap, all AB needs to do is lower per capita spending to BC levels. No one has yet to justify the rationale for AB's overfunding and the tangible benefits enjoyed by its residents.
|
1. The PST was required long ago.
2. You can't set a PST level based on an in-year deficit as this is not a projected deficit over a longer period. Bringing in maybe $3-4B with a 5% PST, even if partially moderated by a slight reduction in personal income taxes, would more than suffice.
3. PST pushes the burden on people buying bigger more expensive things that are not required for regular folks, so is more fair than a flat personal income tax that the cons had.
Agree there are challenges with other areas. I don't get, as an example, why we have a fully funded Catholic system whereas this is not the case for most of Canada. Looking at the BC model on this is good (IE Catholic schools get 30% or 50% instead of 100%), however, the BC model for overall revenue vs. expenditures works better because of PST (which you just slammed in your opening remarks). The BC spending model would not deal with our deficit either, without their PST revenue. If I'm wrong, show me the math.
FYI re: BC:
http://www.bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2009/e..._Estimates.pdf
BC's 7% PST 2009/10 = >$5B, representing 13% of total revenue.
To put that in perspective, natural resource revenue in Alberta is currently 5% of total revenue.